Venezuela’s View of the Snowden Affair

In Venezuela, there was a brief, bright moment when Edward Snowden, the N.S.A. leaker, was expected to land suddenly at Simón Bolívar International Airport, jet-lagged and red-eyed but safe and sound and victorious. His slipping out of Moscow and crossing the world would have been seen as a remarkable act of defiance against the power of the American government. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro had offered him asylum after visiting Russia for the Gas Exporting Countries Forum, at the beginning of July. He declared that Snowden had done nothing wrong and was being subjected to a “crazy manhunt” by the United States authorities, and promised to protect him once he arrived in Caracas. It is probably no accident that Maduro made the announcement on July 5th, Venezuela’s independence day.

Domestic critics argued that Maduro should have given priority to repairing the country’s relationship with the United States, damaged after long years of quarreling under his predecessor, the late Hugo Chávez, particularly after both countries withdrew their ambassadors in 2010. Others speculated that a hero’s welcome for Snowden would give a much-needed boost to Maduro’s popularity. It was also suggested that Snowden would be exchanged for Luis Posada Carriles, a terrorist of Cuban extraction now living in Miami, who Venezuela has been seeking to extradite for blowing up a Cubana Airlines plane in 1976, killing seventy-three people. Or that the Cubans would get their hands on him, and then exchange him for the remaining four members of the Cuban Five—agents convicted in Florida for espionage. Laureano Márquez, a prominent comedian and opposition columnist, wrote that Maduro had expelled the filmmaker Tim Tracy, accusing him without evidence of being a spy for the C.I.A., in order to bring in Snowden, a full-time, real spy.

The impact Snowden’s presence might have on the relationship between the United States and Venezuela was a constant topic of discussion for both Chavistas and the opposition. Speculation about possible U.S. retaliations ran from cancelling the visas of high-level officials to stopping purchases of Venezuelan oil.

There’s no doubt that Snowden would have been a valuable asset for the Venezuelan government, which is seeking to legitimize itself after elections in April were questioned by the opposition, and which has lost much of the glow and potency Chávez conferred to it. But after keeping Venezuela waiting for a formal reply, Snowden, who has now been languishing for a month in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, made the surprise announcement that he will stay in the land of Pussy Riot—and Putin—until the conditions for his journey are more favorable.

At that, the Snowden case disappeared almost instantaneously from Venezuelan media, enveloped in the most rotund official silence. Several government officials asked for comment said that the only people authorized to speak about the case were the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Elías Jaua, and Maduro himself.

Last Thursday, the newspaper ABC de España disclosed that Secretary of State John Kerry had called Jaua on Friday, July 12th, to talk about the Venezuelan offer. The newspaper described Kerry’s tone as intimidating, and said that the Secretary of State had threatened Jaua with bold actions against Venezuela if the asylum materialized. Among other things, these steps would include stopping the sale of gasoline and other oil derivatives from Venezuela and suspending U.S. visas for diplomats, officials, and businessmen. On Friday, an unnamed State Department source told the D.P.A. news agency that, indeed, there had been a call, but that it was “completely untrue” that Kerry had bullied Jaua or given details about possible sanctions. The Venezuelan government’s silence was regarded as an implicit acknowledgement that the issue is too delicate to risk any miscalculation that might worsen the impasse.

The fragile truce was broken when Obama’s nominee for United Nations ambassador, Samantha Power, promised before a Senate committee last Wednesday that she would stand up against “repressive regimes” and “the crackdown on civil society being carried out in countries like Cuba, Iran, Russia, and Venezuela.”

The remarks infuriated Maduro, who, in a full bravado, responded, “As president, my policy is zero tolerance for any attacks the Gringos make on Venezuela. I’m not going to tolerate any sort of aggression against Venezuela—verbal, political, or diplomatic. That’s enough! You there with your empire. No more meddling with Venezuela.” Venezuela, he said, was suspending ongoing talks to improve relations with the U.S. He also reaffirmed his willingness to give asylum to Snowden, since “the right to asylum is an international humanitarian right, and Venezuela has always respected it.”

Maduro, that is to say, found it more convenient to step back to the previous status quo than to move forward and regularize the relations. By doing so, he can claim that he cares enough about the nationalistic values Chávez so firmly defended. As of Friday night, a source close to the Maduro government said that it was highly unlikely that Snowden would go to Venezuela—“He’s not coming here.”

Snowden’s uncertain fate, however, has serious implications for U.S. relations, not just with Venezuela but with many other countries, especially Russia. Snowden might feel that Russia’s strength would provide him with better security than Venezuela, as though he were protected by one of the big boys. It might be a glaring paradox to be sheltered by a government that suppresses freedom of the press and civil rights, but his options are constrained. And, of course, Russia’s asylum would spare him from the prosecution and imprisonment that Bradley Manning, for example, has faced.

There is more than one set of contradictions. The Snowden affair has made evident the U.S. disposition to twist arms. But will other countries be eager to accede to an insistence that they help chase down Snowden now that America is known to have conducted massive surveillance programs all around the world?

What is striking, in Venezuela and elsewhere, is how enmeshed Snowden’s fate is with the complexities of America’s relations with the rest of the world. Asylum offers from Venezuela and a number of other Latin American countries were on the table as a response to a clumsy effort to re-route the President of Bolivia’s plane—in the belief that Snowden was on-board—but also to the disclosure that a number of them, too, had been subject to U.S. espionage. The Obama Administration’s advantage is its ability to pressure governments; Snowden’s comes at the moment when those countries start to mind.

Photograph by Ariana Cubillos/AP

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